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Throughout this year's Britain's Got Talent competition, Lance Corporal Richard Jones has consistently wowed audiences and the judges with his spectacular array of magic tricks.

But on Saturday night the serving soldier-turned-magician pulled another rabbit from his hat, enlisting the support of his idol – a 97-year-old Second World War veteran – in the show’s emotional grand finale.

The 25-year-old army bandsman was crowned this year’s victor after performing a scintillating magic trick while narrating the touching story of Fergus Anckorn, a British soldier taken prisoner following the Japanese occupation of Singapore in 1942.

Moving many in the audience to tears, Lance Corporal Jones used a series of card tricks to describe how Mr Anckorn – who became known as ‘the conjuror of the River Kwai’ – had kept himself and other prisoners alive by performing magic for their Japanese captors.

Played out against the backdrop of the Union Jack, the performance ended with the flag being hoisted-up to reveal the war veteran himself, dressed in a dark navy suit emblazoned with military honours and accompanied by a 12-piece military brass band.

With Jones taking his place beside his 97-year-old idol, both men stood to attention before giving a full military salute to Simon Cowell and his fellow judges.

Now the oldest member of the world’s premier magic society, The Magic Circle, Mr Anckorn is one of the last surviving veterans from the occupation of Singapore, which saw 80,000 British, Indian and Australian soldiers captured by the Imperial Japanese Army in February 1942.

Speaking to the Telegraph, Richard revealed how his first meeting with Fergus in 2013 had inspired him to enter this year’s competition.

“We first met three years ago when I was inducted into the Magic Circle,” he said.

“On my audition night I met Fergus in the club room. I went and joined him as I was also in the army at the time. We spent hours talking about his story and it instantly I knew it was the most fascinating story I had ever heard.

“That week I went out and bought his book ‘Conjuror on the River Kwai’, and I took back and he signed it for me.

“When I first got onto the show and got the four yeses he was really chuffed, and I said ‘wouldn’t it be great if we could do the final together’, almost as a joke because I never thought it was going to happen.

“When I got through the reveal round and I phoned him and said ‘Fergus, I think this might actually happen’, and he said “that’ll be b***** marvellous’.

“Then I got through on Tuesday and he’d told me that he’d already polished his medals and shined his shoes.”

Richard added that Fergus had become a “mentor and inspiration” for him throughout the competition.

“He’s performed magic in the most extreme environments, he performed to survive. I don’t know anyone whose story comes close,” he said.

“He’s always been an inspiration. I’m going to make sure he’s there at the Royal Variety, he’s been a big part of this whole journey.”

Richard is a serving bandsman in The Household Cavalry. Credit:
Syco/Thames TV

Described by Winston Churchill as the “largest capitulation” in British military history, the prisoners taken captive during Japan’s advance towards the Malayan peninsula were later subjected to brutal treatment and torture in sprawling prison camps across South East Asia.

Later chronicled in the 1957 Hollywood war epic Bridge On The Rive Kwai, more than 12,000 of Mr Anckorn’s fellow men-in-arms died after being put to work on the Burma-Siam “Death Railway”, used to transport enemy troops and supplies from Bangkok to Burma.

Then 24 years old, the young artillery private, imprisoned in the notorious Changi prison camp before being put to work on the railroad, was only spared a similar fate thanks to a combination of sheer luck and an endearing talent for magic tricks.

Left seriously wounded with third-degree burns and crippling injuries to his arms and legs following his capture, regular card tricks and cameos earned him and his work gang extra food rations from sympathetic prison guards.

Having been elected the youngest ever member of the Magic Circle in 1936, aged just 18, word of Fergus’s wizardry soon earned him favour with Japanese Commander Osato Yoshio, who spared him from the more gruelling duties of the labour camp.

While more than three quarters of his regiment died before the British captives were finally liberated in September 1945, Fergus’s charm ensured that he was one of the few survivors who boarded the ships at Yokahoma docks to begin the long journey home.

Speaking about his future after winning Britain’s Got Talent, Richard said he has “no plans” to leaving “the career I love”, adding that he hoped to find a flexible compromise between performing magic and serving his country.

He will star in the Royal Variety Performance on Tuesday 6 December at the Hammersmith Apollo theatre.